


"Thorns About Them"

by farad



Category: Magnificent Seven (TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-26
Updated: 2012-08-26
Packaged: 2017-11-12 21:59:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,150
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/496093
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/farad/pseuds/farad
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>For the Daybook prompt from JoJo - Chris, Buck, Ezra and Vin, any, after the guns fall silent.  Another post-"Vendetta" story.  And for the second round of Daybook Bingo for the square "Roses and Thorns".</p>
            </blockquote>





	"Thorns About Them"

**Author's Note:**

> Special thanks to Denorios, Jojo, and Delphi for helping me keep up with who is where, when, why, and how. All mistakes are very much my own, despite often repeated, good, suggestions on their parts.

_"Truths and roses have thorns about them."_  
Henry David Thoreau

 

Nathan stood for as long as he could, staring at the scene before him as the sound of the explosion still roared in this ears. He saw the blood on Josiah's leg, saw how he was standing to keep the weight off it. But Josiah was staring down at the Nichols woman, whose sobbing grew louder as she clung to the hand of one of her sons – the one who had been burning. The one Vin had shot. Nearby, another son lay dead, sprawled on his back.

 

John, the one with the broken arm Nathan had set, the one who now carried one of Nathan's knives lodged in his other arm, stood staring at his mother, but his expression was much different. His expression was one of surprise, his mouth open, his eyes wide. He clutched at his bleeding wound, a finger on either side of the blade, holding it still. He hadn't worked up the nerve yet to pull it out.

 

Nathan took a step forward, thinking of the young man he had treated in the hotel lobby, his complete conviction about their cause. Their cause to kill Hank Connelly. The cause that had led to that last shot, the one that sounded just after the explosion setting his teeth on edge.

 

He knew the knife would was not mortal, just as he knew Josiah's wasn't. They needed to be treated, but there were others who needed it worse. With that thought, he turned to look to where Chris was getting to his feet. Buck was clutching one of his own arms, and there was a dark trail of something dripping across his fingers. Nathan didn't have to ask to know what it was.

 

But as he moved in that direction, Buck's head tilted back and he caught Nathan's eye. Buck shook his head once, a sign that he didn't need or want Nathan's attention at this moment.

 

Nathan nodded, then he looked down to the man at Buck's feet. He'd seen Chris beside the man, on his knees with his hand over Hank's eyes, and he had little doubt that his services were far too late on that score. Buck shook his head again, confirming that Hank Connelly was dead. As if the way Chris' shoulders sagged and he clutched at Hank's knotted cloth weren't confirmation enough.

 

The sight of it, those white knuckles against that grey cloth, reminded Nathan of his own losses, his father, his mother, his grandmother. The pain of it pooled in his belly, strong and deep, and he closed his eyes, trying not to see them, trying not to remember. The image that held strongest, though, was Rain, her fine features twisted as she cried for her father, her hands pushing against Nathan as he tried to pull her to safety, away from Anderson's cannon fire. The sound of it, of her, echoed in his head, as strong as the sounds of the battle they'd just ended.

 

The air around him moved and he jerked, coming back into the moment. Vin was walking past him, looking at the smoking carriage, and Ezra stood beside Nathan. He, too, looked at the street and the clusters of people. Like Josiah, he was leaning to one side, but Nathan saw no blood. "You all right?" he asked Ezra, his voice sounding strained and distant, like someone else's.

 

Ezra blinked, his face drawing into a frown as one hand rose unconsciously to his ear. Nathan suspected that, like himself, Ezra's ears were still ringing from the battle.

 

Nathan stepped closer and said again, "You all right?" The image of Ezra jumping from the armored car flashed through his mind and he searched Ezra's body again for signs of injury. "That was one hell of a chance you took, attacking that armored wagon." Without thinking, he dropped a hand on Ezra's shoulder. The smile was sudden, the emotion behind it exploding through the shock of the moment and grounding.

 

Ezra's eyes widened, and he glanced to Nathan's hand. For a second, Nathan thought his touch was unwelcome, as it had been at the Seminole village. But as he started to pull his hand away, Ezra reached up and dropped his own over Nathan's, keeping Nathan's hand in place. "I may be sore tomorrow," Ezra said, his voice loud enough to carry over the echoes that still hung in the air, "but I am merely bruised at the moment." He smiled back, a warm expression that Nathan had rarely seen.

 

Before he could answer, though, one of the Nichols brothers hobbled into view. He looked pale and unsteady, and he clutched at his side as blood, unmistakeable, flowed over his hand. He moved past Chris and Buck, and the body of Hank Connelly, but he didn't see them, his eyes locked on his kneeling mother.

 

"Ma?" he called, his voice thin with pain. "Are you – you're not – they didn't shoot you – Ma?" He tried to move faster, tried to get to her.

 

Nathan didn't think, his instincts taking over. He was at the man's side in time to catch him as he collapsed. It didn't take a trained doctor to see that this one was going to be tricky, and he was already pulling at the man's clothes when Ezra and Vin came along to help him carry the brother up the stairs to Nathan's rooms.

 

It was much later, as he stood over the man tossing in the bed, that he learned from Vin that this was the one who had led the attack on JD. He was glad that he hadn't known before, that he had held the image of the boy calling to his weeping mother in his head while he was trying to save the man's life, not the image of this son of a bitch hurting one of his own.

 

Not the image of Chris' face as he had leaned over Hank Connelly's dead body, so like Rain in his grief.

 

*&*&*&*&*&

 

Ezra rolled on his feet, heel to toe and back, the muscles stretching reluctantly. It had been far too long since he had done anything of that nature and he was going to pay for it later, but he couldn't help the elation he felt at the moment. His shoulder still tingled pleasantly from where Nathan had touched him before walking away. It was a good feeling, made all the better because he hadn't dislocated his shoulder in the roll, as he had expected.

 

The greatest repercussion from his adventure, so far, was the dull roar in his ears, the aftershock of the explosion which made it hard to hear.

 

"Well done, Ezra," Vin said, his voice barely carrying the short distance from where he stood looking into the smoking wreck of the armored wagon. "That took some kind of balls."

 

"I'm certain any of the rest of you would have done the same," Ezra countered, but he grinned wider at Vin's back.

 

"Don't reckon none of the rest of us thought of it," Vin said, his tone distracted as he tried to look further into the wagon, burning his hand as he put it on the door frame. "This thing's a danger." His tone of voice, though, was admiring.

 

Ezra started to answer, his mind thinking something about Trojan horses, but his eyes caught on Chris and Buck – and the body of Hank Connelly on the ground behind Josiah and the woman who had caused all of this. The look on Chris' face dried the words from his tongue.

 

"Damn," he said softly, taking a step forward. Peripherally, he was aware of Vin turning, too, then the other man's breath catch.

 

Ezra's intent was to go to Chris, to say something, anything, condolences, sympathies, offers of aid. But as he started moving, there was movement past the kneeling, crying witch, one of her sons limping into view.

 

Ezra's first thought was to protect Chris who didn't seem to be aware of the danger. He was already moving forward, Vin right behind him, when the brother called out to his mother. Ezra didn't listen to the words, but he did hear the concern in them. He also saw the blood, and he was just behind Nathan when the man fell the to the ground.

 

As the three of them lifted the brother, maneuvering around the Nichols woman who got to her feet and tried to intervene, Ezra caught glimpses of Chris. He stood still, staring off into the distance, his face lined. His hands were curled around the knotted cloth that Connelly had carried, and every now and then, he would brush it against his cheek, as if wiping something away.

 

After they settled the new patient in Nathan's extra bed, Ezra was tasked with seeing to Josiah, Buck, John Nichols, and any others who weren't gravely injured until Nathan or Vin could get there. He was reminded to check on JD, too, as if he could forget the way JD had looked just before the battle, bloody and battered from the beating the Nichols brothers had given him.

 

It was Chris, though, who worried him the most, saying little that Ezra could hear, even as the ringing in Ezra's ears faded.

 

"No," Chris said, his voice firm.

 

Ezra looked up from where he was bandaging Buck's upper arm, so near the shoulder that Buck had had to strip out of his shirt. Mary was doing her best not to look, even as she helped Ezra with the binding.

 

"Oh, hell," Buck said softly, pulling at the gauze as he started to step away.

 

"We will be careful with him, Mr. Larabee," Ballenger said in his most soothing voice. "We treat all of our customers - "

 

"Get them out of here first," Chris said, his voice so cold that Ezra felt a chill as the words reached his ears.

 

"We are working on that, I assure you - " Ballenger started but Chris cut him off again.

 

"Come back when it's done," he said. He hadn't yelled, hadn't raised his voice – it had been an effort to hear it. But Ezra had no doubt about the threat in it, nor did Ballenger. The undertaker nodded and turned away, helping his men with the Nichols brothers.

 

"Hurry it up, Ezra," Buck said sharply. "I need to get over there." The wound, fortunately was simple, and Mary stood ready with the scissors, glancing to Ezra who motioned for her to cut the gauze. He tied it off, as tightly as he could, then Buck was gone, pulling on his shirt as he trotted back across the stree to Chris.

 

As Buck was the only person Chris seemed to listen to, Ezra was glad for the big man's presence. It relieved him of being the one in Ballenger's, the undertaker's business, a place he knew too well. The etiquette of attending the dead was something he had mastered young; one of the easiest cons was the long-lost relative returned for the funeral. It was one of Maude's favorites.

 

In this town, though, Ezra found that his time in Ballenger's was mostly personal, not professional. He'd never liked those times, as they reminded him too clearly of his own losses. Reminded him too clearly of the losses yet to come.

 

So he allowed himself to do as Nathan and Mary needed, distracting himself by helping the injured and the angry, negotiating tempers and the concerns of others. He smiled and consoled when JD raged, the young man angry that the townspeople didn't sympathize with Chris' loss, with the sacrifices they had all made. Ezra smiled and made noises of agreement as the townspeople complained about the damage to their property, about the minor injuries some had suffered during the exchange of gunfire. He sympathized with Inez when she yelled about the cost of repairing the saloon, promising to contact his mother for the funds.

 

But later in the day, as the distractions ebbed and things began to return to normal, he found himself often walking a path that passed Ballenger's, as if every errand he ran was somewhere on that side of the small town. Eventually, he found himself standing on the boardwalk, watching as Chris sat silent and still next to the casket, his head down, his only movement the slow drawing of the knotted cloth between his fingers.

 

It wasn't much later that he drew Buck out, demanding to know the situation. And it was soon thereafter that Ezra slipped into the undertaker's parlor to join Chris, sitting vigil through the long hours of the night. Ezra's hearing had returned, enough so to hear clearly the cloth slide back and forth through Chris' hands as the darkness deepened before weaving its slow way through the night, and Ezra sat with one foot in Chris' present, sharing his loss, and one in the past, in other funeral parlors and sitting rooms, sitting vigil with his own ghosts.

 

It was a relief when Buck returned hours later, and Ezra made his way to the saloon. He sat with his cards, turning them over and over and over, but he refused the company of others, trading hands with his own memories.

 

*&*&*&*&*

 

"Come on, ma'am," Josiah said tiredly, helping Mrs. Nichols to her feet as first Nathan then Ezra and Vin moved past him toward the son who had managed to draw her attention. The living son. "Let Nathan take care of this."

 

"He's – he's not even a doctor!" Mrs. Nichols said, but the words were muted, as if the will to argue had deserted her. Perhaps it had, though Josiah doubted the desertion would be for long, if it had occurred at all. It could be the post-battle deafness that he sometimes suffered, more now that he was older. "Has God forsaken me?" she asked again for what seemed to be the hundredth time as she bent over to retrieve her rosary from the ground.

 

Josiah had given up trying to answer her. It was pointless. From the day she had arrived, he had struggled with himself. Not with his faith; he was as sure in what he believed now as he had been before he and Vin had left Gloria's store and walked down the boardwalk to the saloon, slowing to watch the carnival as it had roared down the street. In truth, Mrs. Nichols' confrontations with him had reaffirmed his faith, particularly his belief that God's word was dangerous in the hands of a zealot.

 

No, he had struggled with his sense of obligation to minister to those in need. If anyone needed the help of a caring man of the church, it was this woman. She'd lost her husband and now her favorite son, a son that they knew was innocent of killing Chris' wife and son, though he had died for it.

 

Try as he might, though, Josiah could find little sympathy for her. He had tried, how he had tried; it was one of the failings that had forced him to leave the Church, his lack of patience with people like her, people who thought of themselves as Christians even as they practiced the opposite of Christ's very words.

 

And now, having brought upon herself and her stupidly devoted sons this death and destruction, she still could not understand where she had gone wrong. Instead, she clutched at the beads in her hand, her thumb running back and forth over them as if they would make everything all right.

 

When they didn't, she would blame God. She was building toward it now with her questions. God had not forsaken her – she had forsaken God. But she would never understand that.

 

"Ma'am?" a new voice said, and Josiah turned – or tried to; his leg was aching horribly, the bandage gone. He knew the wound wasn't bad, but it wasn't good either. It was in his right leg, close to where he'd been shot by Anderson's Ghosts not so long ago.

 

"What is it?" she demanded of the new person, and Josiah managed to turn his head far enough to see over his shoulder, where Eleazer Ballenger, the undertaker, was standing near but not too close.

 

Ballenger looked at Josiah, and Josiah frowned. As the town's resident man of God, he now had three more duties – possibly four, depending on how things were going in Nathan's surgery. "This is Mr. Ballenger," he said quietly. "He'd like to prepare your sons for what comes next."

 

'What comes next'. It was an expression he'd heard from a Hindu holy man, one of the first men to make him understand that human knowledge was far more limited than that of God – any god.

 

"What comes next?" Mrs. Nichols said, her eyes searching Josiah's face. "What comes next is the Kingdom of Heaven! My boys, my lambs, they will be in God's care – won't they? Won't they?" Her voice got louder, more shrill as she demanded confirmation of her view of life and the afterlife.

 

It was a confirmation Josiah couldn't give, but it was also one he wasn't willing to argue. "Mr. Ballenger will see to it that they rest in comfort – and out of the street," he said, pointedly.

 

For the first time, Mrs. Nichols looked around and he saw the dawning awareness. The shock of the loss was fading. She stared for a few moments at the smoking hulk of her former carriage, then her eyes caught on movement as people started easing back onto the boardwalk. Mary was the first one brave enough to step into the dirt of the road itself and Josiah followed her gaze as it settled on Chris.

 

For the first time, he took a moment to look at their _de facto_ leader. Chris was standing over Hank Connelly, close enough that the scuffed toes of his boots brushed the man's shoulders. Chris' shoulders were hunched, his body curved slightly forward, as if protecting the man on the ground, or maybe protecting himself.

 

Buck stood close, still gripping his upper arm though it looked as if the flow of blood had slowed. He caught Josiah's gaze, held it, then tilted his head to one side, glancing to something near Josiah. Or someone – Ballenger, who was patiently waiting.

 

Josiah looked back to Buck who then shook his head once before looking at Chris. 'Keep Ballenger away from Chris as long as possible.'

 

Josiah nodded, resolving to deal with Mrs. Nichols a little longer, though his leg was truly an irritant.

 

"Ma'am," he said with a little more force, "would you please let Mr. Ballenger and his men move your boys to a more fitting place?" Another set of euphemisms, these gleaned from the priest who had buried his father.

 

"To the church," Mrs. Nichols said, her voice flat.

 

"Ma?" John called, finally coming in close. He still had the knife in his arm, and Josiah wondered if his mother would know what to do. For an instant, he forgot where Nathan was, then recalled that he and Vin had made off to the clinic with the more injured of the Nichols boys – or at least, the more obviously injured. It was time to start looking toward the others.

 

"Josiah? May I help?" He turned toward the soft, feminine voice, relieved to find Gloria Potter at his side. She stared up at him, her eyes holding a touch of fear at the situation, but also determination and concern.

 

"Mrs. Nichols, this is Mrs. Potter. She's going to go with you to the church, let you clean up. I'll be along soon." He reached out his free hand, touching Gloria gently on the shoulder as she smiled at him.

 

"Last Rites!" Mrs. Reynolds squawked suddenly. "We need a priest – a real priest - "

 

"Ma?" John said again. He took his hand away from the knife, reaching out to touch his mother. His fingers dripped blood, some of it splattering on the black lace of his mother's sleeve.

 

"Find your brothers, John," Mrs. Reynolds said, paying no attention to her son's outstretched hand, or the knife sticking out from his arm. "Get everyone to the church. We have – we have - " Her voice broke and she gasped.

 

Gloria stepped in then, taking her hand from Josiah's. Her voice was low as she moved close to Mrs. Nichols, giving Josiah the chance to back away. "Come along, now," she commanded, guiding the larger woman away. "We've got work to do." She glanced at John as she passed him, her gaze sad but her voice firm. "Josiah will see to that," she said, "while he's seeing to himself." She shot one glance quickly at Josiah, making her words a command.

 

It was almost enough to make him smile. Instead, he said, "Come along, John, let's see what we can do." As if on cue, another of the brothers, the youngest one, edged into view, looking after his mother and Gloria but coming up to John.

 

"We got him," the younger brother said, his round face wide and anxious. He still carried a long-barreled rifle, and Josiah thought it might have shot the fatal shot. "Why is Ma crying? John? What did we do wrong?"

 

Josiah shook his head, ignoring the words the brothers were exchanging, trying to ignore the stricken looks on their faces as they stood over the bodies of their dead brothers.

 

The first thing was to find something to lean against, which he did quickly, his leg almost giving out.

 

The second thing was taken care of as Ezra arrived, white bandages and wet cloths in hand. Between them, they made short work of extracting the knife from John's arm, the boy stoic though more likely in shock. He hardly looked at them, both he and his brother watching Ballenger and his men closely as they moved a cart close to their dead kin.

 

Tiny appeared, looking first at Chris, then Buck, then Josiah and Ezra. It was them that he asked what to do, and it was Josiah who told him to move the ruined carriage out of the street and put up the horses. From that point on, Josiah was the one leading the clean-up. It was on his watch that Watson found the third dead brother, whose last words echoed in Josiah's head, complemented by gunfire: "Don't shoot my ma!"

 

It was on his watch that the other two brothers were found, one unconscious, the other suffering a wound that wasn't as bad as the brother upstairs now, but worse than John's. Josiah had him sent off to MacCrarry, the barber, for tending until Nathan was available.

 

Inez's saloon was shot to hell, but it was there that he settled himself as night fell. Inez was sweeping up the broken glass, muttering profanities in Spanish, but when Josiah limped in, she grabbed up a bottle of her best whiskey and put it on the table in front of him. "Gracias," she said simply, touching his shoulder.

 

A few minutes later, Buck eased into the chair across from him. "How bad?" the other man asked, his tone tired.

 

The question drew several answers to mind, so Josiah ticked them off in order of his own priorities. "Nathan and Vin are still upstairs working on – Peter, I think his name is. The other Nichols boys have been tended to and are over at the church with Mrs. Nichols. Ballenger got her boys laid out there, Gloria and Mrs. Watson are handling what they can, Mary's leading the clean-up of the town. Most of the damage seems to be here, though. Well, except for the windows over Miss Maggie's and the Telegraph office which blew out when the carriage exploded." He took a sip of whiskey, appreciating the burn of it as it slid down his throat. His leg was hurting like a son of a bitch. "How's Chris?"

 

Buck sighed, his face creased with lines Josiah had never seen on him before. "His last connection to Sarah," he said softly. "He and Hank had finally found common ground – now this."

 

"At least they had a chance to make peace," Josiah said.

 

"If Hank was in his right mind." Buck's tone was cold, about as cold as Josiah had ever heard it.

 

He turned and looked at Buck. "You know anything about that sort of thing?" he asked hesitantly.

 

Buck shrugged then winced as the movement pulled at his wounded shoulder. "Man was crazy," he said. "He pointed a gun at me, shot me, and didn't even know who I was – hell, you were there, Josiah. What do you think?"

 

Josiah poured another shot into the small glass, stretching his leg out under the table. He was tired, so very tired, of all of this. He needed to go over to the church and say something to the Nichols, he needed to go check on Nathan and see how things were there, he needed to do all the things that a good leader did in the aftermath of this sort of crisis.

 

The image of the Mrs. Nichols' rosary passed through his mind, though, and he heard himself say words he'd never wanted to say to anyone, not even Nathan. "My father did the same thing. Went crazy like that. One minute, he was as sane as you or me – however sane that is. The next . . . " He downed the whiskey in one shot, closing his eyes against the pain of the burn. The pain of the memory.

 

Buck was silent for time, until Josiah rubbed at his eyes with the back of his hand before blinking them open. Buck took up the bottle, refilling Josiah's glass then his own as he asked, "So he knew what he was saying some of the time. How did you know when those times were? Could you tell the difference?"

 

Josiah picked up the glass, annoyed when his shaking hand splashed a little of it out of the glass. It was cool, though, soothing as it fell against the skin of his hand. He cleared his throat, considering his answer. It was one he had struggled long to find and he wasn't sure it was the right one – but it was the one that gave him as much peace as a man could find. "You take what you know of the man, and the words that most agree with that are the truest ones. They're the ones you want to remember."

 

Buck sat back in his chair, looking out the empty space where the window had been and into the night. Light beamed from most of the windows around them, people holding the darkness at bay in the aftermath of the afternoon's terror, and a few people had braved the brightly lit saloon and Inez's ill temper, the low murmur of voices audible as Josiah's hearing improved.

 

"Reckon Chris will come to that determination, in time," Buck said slowly. "He's practical that way, when he wants to be. But it's a shock, all of it."

 

"Chris had a chance to see his wife's father again, and to talk to him," Josiah said, considering. "In time, that will mean a lot to him. Now, though, it's like losing them all over again."

 

Buck drank down the whiskey in his glass then stood up, setting the glass on the table. "Need to go check on him, make sure he's all right. Left Ezra with him, but I don't know how that will go." He flashed a grin, some of his old humor returning.

 

Josiah held up his own glass, looking at the play of light in the amber liquid. "Reckon I need to check on Nathan then get to the church." He drank the whiskey, then sat forward, groaning a little as his injured thigh protested the move.

 

"How about I check on Nathan for you?" Buck offered. "JD might be over there, and I need to see how he is – though he's probably got the best nurse in the town right now, since she's feeling guilty."

 

Josiah smiled then, too, the stretch of his lips feeling odd and out of place, but the humor warmed him in ways the liquor never could. "I'd appreciate that," he said, forcing himself to stand. Buck's helping hand on his shoulder was welcome, not just in its assistance but in its friendship.

 

As they made their way out the door, he glanced toward Ballenger's. The light coming through the open windows was muted, casting shadows on the boardwalk and road in front of it, the outline of man sitting, his body curled forward, head down, in grief. In his hands was a long, thick length, and Josiah remembered Hank's knotted cloth. With no thought, his hand rose to his chest, to the beads he wore there, ones worn slick from his own fingers.

 

*&*&*&*&*

 

"Did you see that?" JD leaned back against the wall, his eyes on the scene in the street. "I can't believe Ezra – did you see that?" He was crouched next to the window, firing as he could. He'd already shot the son of a bitch who had tried to woo Casey – the one who had been the leader as they beat the hell out of JD.

 

"I saw," Casey said, her tone shrill. It bit into his pounding head, but at least he heard it this time. He'd fired so many times that his hearing was dulled, especially now, after the explosion. "How stupid is he?"

 

JD turned to look at her, irritated. Until he saw the worry on her face. It grew as she turned to look at him. Her blouse, the soft white one that she usually only wore to church on Sundays, was streaked with red – his blood. There was some on her skirt, too, and he wondered if she'd be able to get it out. His mother used to say -

 

"JD? Are you all right?" She was beside him suddenly, her fingers pushing at his hair. Her touch was gentle but it hurt, the bruises from the beating still forming.

 

"I'm fine," he said, but he closed his eyes for a few seconds, just letting himself be close to her. He was jolted back to the task at hand, though, by shouts from outside then one single, loud shot. There was a clatter from downstairs, then one loud voice that carried above everything else called out, "We got him, Ma!"

 

Silence, or a stillness that was so sudden it may as well have been silence. JD moved to look out the window, Casey pressing against his back. Below, he saw Chris walking quickly down the street, his face grim.

 

It could only mean one thing: Hank Connelly had been shot.

 

He pushed back, struggling to get to his feet. Casey clung to him, her hands against his shoulders, her weight heavy against him. "I think they shot Hank," he said, trying to push away from her but doing it carefully. "I've got to - "

 

"You need to stay here," she said, reaching up to touch the space between his nose and his upper lip. The place where blood still gathered, his nose still dripping. He suspected it was broken, feared that a lot of him was broken, but he couldn't stop for that, not now.

 

"Something's wrong," he said, trying to be as patient as he could be. "I've got to get down there - "

 

"You can't help them, JD, not hurt and bleeding like you are," she said. She looked stubborn, looked like she would argue for the sake of it – as she usually did.

 

But as he opened his mouth to speak, he saw the fear again, saw her worry that something might happen to him.

 

"Casey," he said, trying to keep his voice calm, "I need to do what I can do. What they need me to. I can't do that up here. I'm not so hurt I can't be there – hell, if nothing else, I can sit at the jail with prisoners." He leaned down enough to rest his forehead against hers. "I'm all right. Which is more than I can say for some of them." He hoped, desperately, that that 'them' didn't include his friends.

 

Casey stared up at him, her mouth opening and closing a couple of times before she stepped back. "Let's go," she said, determined. "I can help, too."

 

He didn't like the idea. Casey was part of the problem, she had drawn the attention of the Nichols brothers. But she wouldn't stay here, not without one hell of a fight, and right now, he didn't have the time for it.

 

Not to mention the stamina. He was having enough trouble staying on his feet.

 

As if he had said it out loud, Casey stepped up close to him, catching his elbow in her hand and guiding him toward to door, into the hall, and then down the stairs. They stopped as they neared the bottom, taking in the damage. Glass was everywhere, tables overturned, the smell of alcohol sharp in the room. The front windows were gone, and through them, JD could see Buck standing, holding his right arm with blood trickling through his fingers.

 

JD took another step, his boots thudding on the wooden floor of the saloon. He opened his mouth to call out to Buck, but before he could make a sound, Buck's head jerked and his eyes caught JD's. The look in them was nothing JD had ever seen before, certainly not on Buck.

 

After a few seconds, in which JD's stomach fell to somewhere near his knees, Buck took a breath and shook his head, once. JD took a step forward, then, as Buck's eyes widened in alarm, he stopped.

 

And he looked. Through the broken window, just above the bottom of the frame, he saw Chris on his knees beside the body of Hank Connelly.

 

It was the most horrible thing he had ever seen. Not the idea of a dead body; he had been the one to sit with his mother as she died, the cancer ravaging her body to the point that when relief had finally come and she was no longer in pain, he barely recognized her face as that of the woman he had known all of his life.

 

No, this was the way Chris looked. Of all the people he had ever known, Chris Larabee was the strongest, the most determined, the most untouchable. Yet here he was, on his knees, his hands in helpless fists as he stared down at his wife's dead father.

 

A death he could do nothing about.

 

"JD," Casey murmured beside him. "Come on." She tugged at his arm, drawing him away from the sight and toward Inez who was standing in the doorway to the back of the saloon, her hands on her hips, her eyes wide with disbelief.

 

"What have they done?" she asked, her accent so thick that JD had a hard time understanding.

 

"They protected as many of us as they could," Casey said firmly. "Is anyone else hurt?"

 

JD glanced back over his shoulder to where Buck was still standing, blood dripping down his arm. At least it was dripping, and Buck didn't seem to be in too much pain.

 

Inez drew in a breath then dropped her arms, turning around. Over her shoulder, she called, "That is a good question. Let us find out."

 

Everyone was not all right. As they came out the back of the saloon and into the alleyway behind it, they met Virgil Watson. "Ballenger's going to be busy tonight," the shopkeeper said with a grimace. "So's Nathan. They're carrying one of the Nichols upstairs now, and he was bleeding something awful. At least two of them are down in the street, and I think Josiah's hurt too – he's with that old bat of a woman, but he's having trouble staying on his feet. Not that she gives a tinker's dam."

 

"Should have shot her," Casey said, and despite himself, JD grinned, ignoring the way it pulled at the cuts in his lips.

 

"You shouldn't talk like that about someone's mother," he said, teasing her.

 

"Someone's mother," she shot back, glaring at him, "tried to kill all of you."

 

He couldn't disagree with that, not feeling the way he did or hearing about the injuries to his friends. The image of Chris flashed through his mind and he lost all amusement.

 

"We should see if Nathan needs help," Inez said, turning the opposite way down the alley, following Watson who turned off at the back entrance to Ballenger's Funeral Parlor. It was a longer walk to Nathan's this way but none of them felt brave enough yet to enter the street where the fight had taken place.

 

The rest of the day was a whirlwind, Casey and JD doing whatever Nathan needed, fetching water, washing bandages, helping Vin as more people came up with wounds. They took turns delivering things to Ezra, MacCrary the barber, Mary, and others who were helping out where they could, though Inez was the one who made the trips to and from the church when Gloria Potter sent word that she was tending to the Nichols family while Josiah led the clean-up in the street.

 

There were constant questions about Chris, though they were always asked in hushed tones. No one understood what had happened or why, and the rumors were flying. JD heard everything from the idea that the Nichols family had been run out of Kansas City and were trying to set up shop here, to Hank Connelly being Chris' father, a gunfighter who had taught Chris everything he knew. The first time someone speculated something wrong, JD tried to explain, but the story that he heard himself telling seemed as farfetched as the one he'd been told.

 

And more importantly, it was Chris' story to tell, not his. So he let others try to get information out of him, stewing in frustration at the heartlessness of it. It was the mood he was in when he walked past Ballenger's on his way to Nathan's, almost tripping over Buck as he came out of the undertaker's doorway.

 

"Buck!" he said, relieved and irritated at the same time. "Where the hell have you been?" Which was the stupidest question he could have asked, and he knew it before the words were completely out of his mouth.

 

Buck didn't dignify it with an answer, though, not even picking at JD for asking the obvious. Instead, he asked, "Are you all right?"

 

Which made JD feel even worse as he recalled Buck's hand clutching at his shoulder as the blood trickled over his fingers. "Better than you, I guess," he said. "How are you?" He looked at Buck's jacket, seeing the hole in it and the dark blood stains around the hole.

 

"Patched up for the moment," Buck said, trying to smile. It didn't quite settle on his face, though, and JD realized how tired his friend was. "Feel better than you look."

 

"That ain't hard right now," JD said, trying for his own smile. But the image of Chris came to mind again and before he could stop himself, he reached out and caught Buck's good arm, pulling him to a stop. "How's Chris?" he asked. "Is he going after them? They're in the church, Buck – he can't go in there shooting at people, it's a house of God - "

 

"He ain't going after nobody," Buck said, but he did smile then, and though it wasn't the smile JD was used to, it was more than the sorry attempt before. It didn't last long, gone as soon as Buck started to talk. "Chris is pretty upset, as you'd expect. Hank was Sarah's father, and while he and Chris didn't get on, he was someone else who loved Sarah. Chris – well, it's hard. Real hard, especially knowing what Hank did, killing David Nichols."

 

"Tiny says there could be more, too," JD said, remembering the conversation he'd had with the livery man when they'd run into each other earlier. "He said that there were two men in town a couple of days ago talking about how a man in a tan coat had passed a friend of theirs on the street then turned around and shot him. The way they described him, it could have been - "

 

"JD." Buck twisted his arm, the one JD was still holding, so that he was holding onto JD instead. His voice was low and he took a step closer even as he looked around them. When he looked back at JD, he said even more softly, "Hush now. Don't you be spreading those kind of rumors. Chris has enough to deal with, he doesn't need to be worried about things we don't have any proof of."

 

JD frowned and felt the bruises in his face ache all the more. "But what if they're right? What if it was Hank? Doesn't the family of that man deserve to know what happened? I mean, Chris is still looking for Sarah's killer – well, I guess he is, now that we know David Nichols didn't do it. Isn't this sort of the same thing?"

 

Buck stared at him, and JD wondered if he'd said something stupid. But it sounded right to him – they were looking for the killer of Chris' family. The Nichols had been looking for the killer of their kin. Others would come looking for the man who'd killed their kin, and if that man was Hank Connelly, then Chris and the six of them needed to be ready.

 

After a minute or so, Buck closed his eyes. His face scrunched to tight that JD thought his shoulder must really be hurting, and he opened his mouth to tell Buck to sit down. But Buck spoke first, his words barely a whisper. "You're right, JD. It's something we have to deal with. But not tonight. Tonight, Chris is sitting vigil with Hank. Let him have tonight to mourn before we bring up even more problems."

 

"Yeah, okay," JD said, "I wasn't going to say it to him. He looked so . . . " He couldn't find the words for how awful it had been, seeing Chris like that.

 

"Yeah," Buck said. His face tightened even more before he opened his eyes. "Ezra's with Chris right now. I'm going to the saloon for a few minutes, get a shot of some kind of painkiller, then I'm going to go up and see Nathan."

 

JD drew a breath, thinking that a shot of something would be nice. Then he remembered that he had promised to get something for Nathan and Vin to eat, and Inez was too busy cleaning to cook tonight.

 

"You go on along," Buck said as if knowing JD's mind. "I'll be up in a while."

 

"You sure you're all right?" JD asked as Buck let go of his hand and stepped back.

 

Buck flashed a quick grin, but it didn't reach his eyes. "I'll be along soon," he promised. "And JD? Don't say anything to anyone else about what you heard from Tiny. Let's keep this quiet for a little while."

 

JD watched as Buck made his way to the doors of the saloon. Inez was sweeping and muttering in Spanish, and the lamps were turned up high even though it was still light out. Buck was right, this wasn't something Chris needed to hear tonight.

 

And as the evening passed by, it wasn't something JD had much of a chance to think on again, Nathan keeping him so busy that it was only when he got to sleep, hours later, that the thought came to him at all, and that was on the edges of sleep, when the image of Chris came to him again, his head bowed, his hands tight around that long strand of cloth, and the sound of gunfire echoing through JD's dreams.

 

*&*&*&*&*

 

"How is he?"

 

The voice startled Buck, coming out of the dark as it had. He hadn't heard anyone approach and he wondered if he was still suffering from the hard-hearing that came after a gun fight. But he hadn't been so deaf that he didn't recognize the voice immediately. There was no one with that rasp and drawl and worry. The voice sounded exactly the same way it had yesterday when they were sitting on the boardwalk, watching Ezra try to talk to the sons of bitches who had succeeded in killing Hank, despite everything Chris had done.

 

"He's inside," Buck said, glancing to where Vin stood beside him. It was late – early, really, well after midnight. The town had calmed down, lights going out gradually, though he thought some people might be sleeping with them lit. The Nichols had left the church, the old bitch surrounded and protected by the surviving members of her brood. She, herself, hadn't bothered to make the trip up to Nathan's to check on Peter, the one that was in the worst shape. Instead, she'd sent John, which was good as it served to let Nathan check on John, too.

 

No, she was too lost in grief and anger, blaming them all for what she had started. Buck wasn't sure what made him madder, that she had put the blame for this on them, Chris mostly, or that she had no idea what it had cost Chris Larabee, not just in terms of the loss of Hank Connelly, but in the loss of Chris' faith in yet another person. In Chris' loss of faith in himself.

 

Again.

 

"They're going to be here another day or so," Vin said, as if he knew what Buck was thinking. "J'siah said that she wants to travel as soon as possible. She told Ballenger to get the bodies ready to go 'cause she ain't leaving them here. She wants a real priest and some kind of sacred ground."

 

"Sanctified ground," Buck said without thinking. He felt Vin's eyes on him, knew the other man was surprised. He should have left it alone, but it was late, and he was tired, so damned tired, that he really wasn't sure if this was real or a dream. "Catholics believe that the ground has to be blessed by a priest high up in the church before a person of their faith can be buried there. Josiah can explain it better than me. It's mostly something that happens when a new church is built."

 

"The church here wouldn't have it?" Vin asked. "It was a mission a long time ago."

 

Buck shrugged. "It might have, back when it was built. But it was empty before Josiah came along. Like I said, he'd know more about it than me. Whatever the case, I'm glad it's getting them the hell out of town."

 

"Yeah," Vin agreed, leaning against an upright. "Think they've done enough damage already." He yawned, raising one hand above his head in a stretch. They stood in silence for a time, until Vin asked, "Is it as bad as last time?"

 

Buck turned to look at him, thinking the question was stupid. Until Vin also turned, looking at him. "Bastard," he said, but it was without heat.

 

"Yep," Vin agreed easily, "reckon I am. Don't make it any less true though."

 

Buck let out a long breath, but something in him eased. "No, it's true. This is bad. He's hurting something awful. Josiah says losing Hank after they'd found some peace is like losing Sarah all over again."

 

"Josiah ain't usually wrong about this sort of thing," Vin said. "Reckon that explains why Chris is hanging onto that cloth of Hank's."

 

"Hank told him not to forget. It was the last thing he said."

 

Vin shifted, turning so that his back was against the upright and he was looking at Buck. The light coming through the window showed the splotches and trails of blood on his blue shirt. He was wearing his coat over it, but his bandana was gone, lost to someone else's blood, Buck suspected. "Chris thinks getting on with his life is wrong. He thinks that giving up the hunt means forgetting them."

 

Buck stared into the night. Part of him wished they were back in the fight, where the sound of gunfire overroad everything else, keeping away these sorts of thoughts, these discussions. "He loved them with everything he had," he said softly. "Guess he thinks that won't ever happen again."

 

Vin made a soft noise that might have been a laugh. "Sure as hell won't if he won't let it."

 

Buck shrugged. It was hard to argue with the obvious. But right now, it wasn't really the point. "Ballenger was going to talk to Josiah about the funeral."

 

"Yep," Vin said. He bent one knee, resting his foot against the post behind him. "Tomorrow if Josiah's up to it. If Chris is ready."

 

Buck nodded. Tomorrow. The sooner, the better as far as he was concerned. As if in agreement, the wound in his arm twinged, the pain deep and sharp.

 

"You should get some sleep," Vin said. "You knew Hank better than anyone here but Chris. He's gonna need you tomorrow."

 

Buck glanced over his shoulder, toward the parlor. Through the window, he could see Chris, who was sitting as he had been for the past hours, head bowed, pulling Hank's knotted cloth through his hands. "JD said . . . " he started, but the words trailed off. He wasn't sure he was up to this, but if anyone other than JD felt the need to mention it to Chris, it would be Vin.

 

"Yeah, Tiny told me the same thing," Vin said, his voice still easy. "Reckon that's a problem for another time. Got enough trouble without begging for more."

 

Buck looked at Chris. Vin was right, Buck had seen Chris at his worst. This was bad, but it wasn't like before.

 

His shoulder throbbed again, and he lifted his good hand to rub at his head. As he dropped it, he found Vin standing beside him, lifting one hand to Buck's shoulder. "Go on," he said softly, "I'll stay with him."

 

"Ain't you had a long day, too?" Buck asked, stretching his hand the short space between them to touch Vin's chest, where a particularly thick patch of blood had stiffened the fabric.

 

Vin shrugged, the cloth moving under Buck's finger. "You knew Hank, too," he said, putting weight on the last word. "Reckon you got a few demons of your own to deal with."

 

"Yeah, well, son of a bitch shot me," Buck countered, but he couldn't get any heat behind it now, recalling Josiah's words about his father.

 

"No, man who shot you was an old man with no sense," Vin countered, his fingers tightening warmly. "Reckon Chris ain't the only one who's been thinking of the past these last few days. You go on to bed, get some of it off your mind before you have to stand with Chris at the funeral."

 

It was a temptation, one too big to ignore. He moved his hand to Vin's shoulder for a few seconds before pushing himself to stand. "Thanks," he said as Vin stepped back.

 

Vin nodded, turning toward the door to the funeral parlor. "It's what you do for kin."

 

It was only later, as he blew out his lamp and closed his eyes, that Buck wondered what Vin had meant by that. It was no matter, though; Vin, JD, and the others were as much kin to him now as any of blood – more in some ways. He rubbed the tips of his fingers together, remembering the blood on Vin's shirt, the blood on his own shirt, Josiah's blood, Hank's blood – Chris' hand on Hank's face. They all shared blood, but in a more obvious way.

 

Given what he'd seen of the Nichols woman, he thought that their way, while more physically painful, was the better way.

 

*&*&*&*&*&*

 

Vin stood in the doorway, his hat in his hand, watching Chris as the sound of Buck's slow steps faded. The night was quiet, the slight breeze off the desert carrying only the low chirp of early-morning insects. The birds wouldn't be out for a while yet, nor, thankfully, would people. He'd had just about all of them today that he could stand.

 

Chris pulled Hank's cloth back and forth through his hands, his fingers touching every knot as if it were a memory.

 

He eased his way into the room, walking carefully to where Chris sat beside the closed casket. It was a nice one, polished wood, not the rough stuff that Vin was familiar with. His hand moved instinctively to touch it, but he caught himself. Hank was Chris' kin, not his.

 

"What time is it?" Chris asked, his words thick and rough. He didn't look at Vin, his eyes still closed, his hands still moving over the knots.

 

"Late. Early. Before dawn," Vin answered, not whispering, but as soft as he could. The room smelled of incense, a thick, cloying smell that made Vin's nose twitch and he rubbed at it, trying to hold off a sneeze.

 

Chris swallowed, then he opened his eyes. He tried to look up, but he'd been sitting in the same position for so long that his body was stiff and he ended up having to sit back in the chair. In the light of the parlor's lamps, he looked like Death himself, his skin grey and thin and stretched tightly over his bones. "Don't know why we do this," he said, his voice hitching on the words. "Sit vigil. Ain't like they're coming back."

 

Vin nodded his agreement. "Ain't for us. It's what they'd want, to be remembered, to be missed. Reckon we might too, when the time comes."

 

"You think so?" Chris asked, and there was a little spark of something behind the question, maybe curiosity.

 

Vin caught sight of another rail-back chair near the wall and he pulled it closer to Chris then sat down, dropping his hat onto the floor beside him. "No way to know what happens after we die," he said. "Reckon most people want to believe in something better, something that's a reward for suffering here." He couldn't stop the image of the Nichols woman on her knees in the road, crying over her son and asking Josiah about God's intentions. The very idea of it made him want to laugh, but he knew better than to do so. Wasn't his place to question others and what they wanted to know about God. Wasn't his business.

 

Chris swallowed again, blinking a few times. "Don't know what I want," he said, looking at the coffin. "Don't reckon it will matter, anyway."

 

Vin leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. "Hard to make sense of all this, him showing up out of the blue and all. Reckon you got a lot to think about."

 

Chris shrugged, looking at the cloth he held. "Can't stop thinking about them, Sarah and Adam."

 

Vin leaned forward enough to reach out and drop a hand on Chris' knee. "That's good, ain't it? Remembering them?"

 

Chris' face drew in, deep wrinkles setting into the corners of his eyes and mouth, but he didn't argue. After a time, he sighed and nodded, once.

 

Vin sat back in the chair, leaving Chris to his thoughts. He had his own to consider, always did when he sat in a funeral parlor. He'd been in more than he liked, knew he'd be in more before it was his time to be resting in the box.

 

The sky was lightening, no sun yet, but the darkness was giving way to a deep grey, when Chris slowly stood up. He walked to the windows, as if the lamplight made it hard for him to see what was out there. Vin watched him but stayed silent. Eventually, as he'd expected, Chris took a deep breath and straightened, his shoulders rolling back and his head coming up.

 

"Have they left yet?" he asked, his voice soft but some of its steel returning. It was that hardness that let Vin know who 'they' were.

 

"Not yet," he said. "One of the boys was hurt pretty bad. We got the bullets out of him, but as of when I left, he was still out. She's waiting 'til he's ready to travel to head back."

 

"Hope she's happy," Chris said, the bitterness making his words a lie. "Those boys . . . "

 

"Those boys," Vin said quietly, "ain't all boys. They're making their own choices, just like you and me and JD, and everyone else here. Ezra says they had a pa once, man who ended up in prison where he died. She's running things. They can walk away, if they want to."

 

One of them had, the one Hank Connelly had killed. Vin didn't say that, though. He didn't have to.

 

"Hank. . . " Chris turned back, looking at the casket. "Wonder how many others there are."

 

Vin looked at him, not surprised that Chris had already thought of it. But as he'd told Buck, now wasn't the time. Instead, he caught a flicker of light out the window and got to his feet, picking up his hat along the way. "Looks like Mrs. Bickerson's up and putting on the coffee," he said, returning the chair to its place against the wall. "You want me to bring you a cup?"

 

Chris was still staring at the casket, and Vin walked to the door, giving him time to think. He stopped, resting his hand on the knob and watching Chris.

 

After a time, Chris' chin jutted out and he looked directly at Vin. "Reckon I can get it myself," he said, walking back to his chair to collect his own hat from the table against the wall.

 

But he took a minute to reach out and drop a hand on the casket, and Vin heard him say something. He was curious, but he turned the knob and eased his way through the door and outside. He watched the sky lighten a little more as he waited, but it didn't have time to see the first rays of sun before Chris stepped out behind him, closing the door firmly. With a nod to Vin, he set off down the boardwalk, his stride easy and peaceful.

 

Vin matched it, the silence between them natural.

 

But when Chris got to the door of the restaurant, he stopped and turned back, looking at Vin. "Reckon I owe all of you thanks for standing by me. I made a mistake about Hank. I was wrong to - "

 

Vin held up one hand, cutting him off. "Like I said, everybody makes choices. You did what you did for kin. Like you should have. Like she did. Like we did. Nothing to be sorry for."

 

Chris held his gaze for a few seconds then nodded before turning to walk inside, and Vin smiled, feeling the stir of relief.

 

*&*&*&*&*&

 

Chris heard the gunfire, heard the explosion, heard the sudden silence. He saw Ezra roll off the carriage, saw Vin and Nathan hunkered down behind the water trough, saw two Nichols brothers come out of the carriage, one on fire, the other firing both of his guns at anything that moved. He saw both of them go down, and the third, the one Chris had injured when he'd ridden back into town and arrived just in time to pull Hank up onto his horse, was saved from dying by Nathan's knife-throwing.

 

But all of that was vague, a colorless dream that replayed in his head, ending with a deafening rifle shot and the sight of Hank bouncing out the doors of the saloon to land on the ground.

 

Ending with the words that played over and over in his head: "Remember...not to forget, Chris Larabee."

 

Other voices came and went, Buck's mostly, but also Ballenger, Ezra, Josiah, and eventually Vin. It was Hank's, though, that played on and on, like a player piano that never ran down.

 

It was Hank's that called out the memories of Sarah and Adam, their voices, their laughter, their lives.

 

It was the last thing Hank gave to him, in the knots of the cloth he carried, the one thing Chris would never be able to thank him for, not in this life.

 

He did say the words, though, when Hank's voice in his head slowly quieted just before dawn, as Vin stood outside the funeral parlor. As Chris turned away from the casket, lifting his hat to head, he heard the quiet of his own thoughts for the first time in days.

 

He tucked the knotted cloth into his back pocket, knowing that he held the memories in it now, and he could call them back whenever he wanted.

 

 


End file.
